


Pushing Parks

by angelica



Category: Parks and Recreation, Pushing Daisies
Genre: AU, Cross Over, F/M, Gen, pushing daisies / parks and recreation
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-04-05
Updated: 2017-04-18
Packaged: 2017-12-07 14:07:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 16,107
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/749369
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angelica/pseuds/angelica
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Leslie Knope, the Waffle Maker, has a very special gift, discovered as a young girl that she could return the dead parks and recreational activities back to life along with other beings in them with just one hug. Her random gift becomes the beginning of events happening in the town of Coeur de Pawnee.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A Pro-Waffle-Logue

**Author's Note:**

> Please ignore the Ao3 chapters names and go with the chapter titles at the beginning of each chapter - there is a prologue and Ao3 considers it as a separate chapter and messes the chapter numbering.
> 
> Also, I am neither Michael Schur nor Bryan Fuller, I do not own either shows. I wish I owned ABC and NBC though so I would give both shows the amazing credit, support and advertisement they deserve.

**_A Pro-Waffle-Logue_**

At this very moment in the town of Coeur de Pawnee, Ben Wyatt was 36 years, 264 days and 19 hours 33 minutes old and not a minute older.

Walking around in Ramsett Park, he started dwelling on why he was walking around in Ramsett Park. When he had decided to meet the unknown resource provider, he was more than willing to be one step closer to solve the mystery that was the corruption of the town. He walked in the darkness, trying to get to the location he was going to meet the anonymous man, hoping he would be finding some answers to the corruption of the town that was a mystery. As he stepped on some broken fluorescent tubes, he decided that it wasn’t the best idea to be in the closed park at dark.

“It isn’t the best idea to be in the closed park at dark,” he mumbled as he reached where the broken swing set was, unaware of the fact that it would be his last thought. As he was thinking about his idea, Ben Wyatt was killed by a plastic bag with a smiley face on it. Ironically he had been against using smiley faces as means of communication and was a firm believer in recycling. He breathed out his last breath and his body fell on the ground, right on some trash bags, dead. Ben Wyatt was 36 years, 264 days, 19 hours and 33 minutes old when he was killed. At that moment in the town of Coeur de Pawnee, an event occurred that is not, was not and should never be considered an ending for endings are where we begin.


	2. Chapter 1

**_Chapter 1_ **

Leslie Knope, the Waffle Maker as she was known, was 36 years, 99 days, 10 hours and 3 minutes old when the chain of events that would change her life forever unfolded in the form of her secret partner Ron Swanson entering JJ’s Waffle Haus which she owned, worked at as a waitress and made waffles at as the Waffle Maker with her best friend Ann Perkins who was not aware of the secret partnership between her and Ron Swanson.

Leslie Knope had a secret. A secret she had discovered when she was 8 years, 24 weeks, 10 hours and 22 minutes old, out in the backyard of her house where the leaves were falling down and the grass was getting yellower and a crew from the Coeur de Pawnee Parks and Recreation department was arguing with her father about cutting down the willow tree, which happened to be her favorite tree. Robert Knope was against cutting down trees when they were sick, he had always been a firm believer of any organism being able to live long if it was looked after carefully. He had demonstrated this belief of his when his wife Marlene Griggs-Knope was sick and he had nursed her back to life.

Young Leslie never liked adults arguing with each other by raising their voices and not listening to one another. Whenever she heard arguing, most common between her parents, she always did her best to stop the arguing whatever the cost. On that very day, Leslie Knope stopped her father and the parks department with the easiest way she knew. She started screaming. She screamed so loud that birds flew away, that windows started shaking, that dogs started barking, that babies started crying. In a few minutes, there was no argument, just some adults looking at her, confused, trying to find a way to stop her from screaming. They did what they best could, they left young Leslie and she stopped screaming immediately, her throat sore, a smile of victory on her face.

Once she knew the crew was gone and her father was safe in their house, no longer arguing with anyone, young Leslie went to the backyard. The look of the garden brought the smile on her face down but she did not know what to do about it. She went next to her willow tree and looked up. The tree no longer resembled what it used to be, it had no leaves left, the branches were lower than ever. Leslie closed her eyes and wrapped her arms around the bulk of the tree as widely as she could. A bee buzzing next to her was what made her open her eyes.

Lights blinded her for a moment. The garden looked different. She could not believe her eyes. When she looked up, she realized that she no longer could see the misty autumn sun between the branches of her tree, for the branches of her tree were full of green leaves. The grass was greener, there were daisies here and there. She could hear crickets chirping. She thought it was strange and ran back to her house. When her father saw the same sight two minutes later, the mug in his hands fell to the ground, and he fell to the ground too, dead.

Marlene Griggs-Knope found her crying daughter on the ground next to her dead husband. He was declared to die of a vessel bursting in his brain, killing him instantly. Young Leslie realized that she herself had brought the backyard back to life and that it had grave consequences. She promised to herself that she would never do it again unless it was absolutely necessary. She used her power again only for five other occassions. The sixth one would be the most significant one and was prompted by the director of Coeur de Pawnee's Parks and Recreation Department, Ron Swanson.

Ron Swanson was the sole keeper of Leslie Knope’s secret. And this is how he became the sole keeper of Leslie Knope’s secret.

Ron Swanson met Leslie Knope when the Harvest Festival was on the verge of ruin. During the last day of the festival, the land that the Wamapoke people had supposedly put a curse on had seemed to be really under the curse that the Wamapoke people had put. Everything was going worse and worse. Ron Swanson was unable to find a generator to give power to the ferris wheel, the corns in the corn maze were dying because of some unexplained pesticide and some idiot had switched the tubes of waste water and drinking water so there were twenty people vomiting in the first aid tent. Everything was in chaos.

Ron Swanson took a bite from his Swanson, a turkey leg wrapped in bacon and drank some whiskey and watched as the chaos unfolded. He knew that this was going to be his last project as a government employee. Though he was against any form of government, he liked his job because it paid well and he didn’t have to do much.

From the corner of his eye in the darkness, he saw Leslie Knope walk towards the Ferris Wheel, hug the switchboard of the wheel and close her eyes. The very next moment, the Ferris Wheel was running again, the corns were standing tall and healthy and twenty people with huge smiles on their faces were leaving the first aid tent. And also a swarm of bees flew away, scaring some children. And L'il Sebastian, the mini horse with a honorary degree from Notre Dame, was found dead in his pen. That was the second time ever Ron Swanson cried ever in his life.

Mr. Swanson offered a partnership. Running a parks department was easier when he had someone who could bring parks and recreational activities back to life on board. Leslie Knope reluctantly agreed. Leslie Knope would help Ron Swanson with his parks whenever it was absolutely necessary and Ron Swanson would make sure that he and his colleagues would eat their breakfasts and lunches only at JJ’s Waffle Haus.

“I’ll get him,” Leslie exclaimed towards the direction of the kitchen where the beautiful ex-nurse Ann Perkins was trying to avoid the advances of the cook Tom Haverford. “Ron Swanson, what can I get you today?”

Ron Swanson sat at his booth, looked at the menu. “Give me all the eggs and bacon you have,” he said nonchalantly, then opened his mouth. “Okay, here's the situation.”

“Your parents went away on a week's vacation. They left the keys to the brand new Porsche. Would they mind? Umm, well, of course not.” Leslie Knope started rapping and dancing around. “I'll just take it for a little spin and maybe show it off to a couple of friends. I'll just cruise it around the neighborhood. Well, maybe I shouldn't. Yeah, of course I should. Pay attention, here's the thick of the plot. I pulled up to the corner at the end of my block. That's when I saw this beautiful girlie girl walking. I picked up my car phone to perpetrate like I was talking,” she brought her cell-phone to her ear while Ron stared at her, not amused. “The sun roof was open, the music was high. And this girl's hand was steadily moving up my thigh. She had opened up three buttons on her shirt so far. I guess that's why I didn't notice that police car. I can't believe it, I just made a mistake. Well, parents are the same no matter time nor place. So to you all the kids all across the land. Take it from me, parents just don't understand.” She finally stopped.

There was a sudden and loud applauding in the diner. Leslie looked around and bowed with a smile on her face. Ann shouted from the kitchen. “Do it again!”

“Thank you, thank you.” Leslie bowed again to her audience. “Just a little something I know,” she mumbled before returning to Ron’s booth. “So what's up Swanson?”

“There is someone dead in Ramsett Park. I need you to get down there right away.”

Leslie’s eyes grew wider and she collapsed into the booth. “Oh my god, why didn’t you tell me before? That park has been dead for years, why is there a dead body there?”

“That’s what we are going to find out,” Ron said.

“Let me go get my blazer. Do you want your eggs and bacon to go?”


	3. Chapter 2

**_Chapter 2_ **

Long after her father’s funeral, young Leslie Knope was lying on the green grass of her backyard, looking up at the sun. The weather was cold but she was not feeling it. Fall was finally in the air though not in her backyard as the garden was still green and alive while just next door the trees were barren and dark. She sat in the same position, not hearing the person coming to her direction.

“Hi.” That was the first time Leslie Knope ever heard Ann Perkins.

“Hi,” Leslie said, not mirroring the enthusiasm in Ann’s voice.

“If it is any consolation, my dad died as well,” Ann commented and she sat down next to young Leslie. “We moved next door, I’m Ann Perkins.”

And that was how Leslie Knope met her first and best friend. The unique ethnic blend of her next door neighbor made young Leslie think that Ann Perkins came ready-made from the playdough factory of life where she was molded into being by mixing different colors of dough together. In their wildest imaginations, Leslie and Ann were the most powerful women in the world, bringing peace to it. Leslie was the President of the Universe while Ann was the most amazing and beautiful doctor, finding cures for illnesses and taking care of humans and animals not by pulling out weird objects from their butts but by singing to them.

Through countless playdates, slumber parties, first kiss stories and first heartbreaks, Leslie Knope and Ann Perkins were inseparable, until one day the Perkins family moved out in the middle of the night without telling anyone or leaving any messages behind. Leslie Knope did not hear from Ann Perkins again until after they were both adult women who went through other dates, slumber parties, kisses and heartbreaks without the knowledge of the other and who were yet to achieve their dreams.

The day Leslie Knope and Ann Perkins met again was also the day Leslie Knope used her power for the second time. She was walking around in the wonderful town of Coeur de Pawnee when she happened by a site that was not so wonderful. It was a park she knew from her childhood, a place where her father would bring her to play, and then she would come to with Ann Perkins years later as teenagers. Tucker Park was empty and abandoned now. The sight broke Leslie Knope’s heart. It had been 21 years, 24 weeks since the day she had hugged a park and lost a father and she had not thought about the bringing-a-park-back-to-life thing ever since even though she was constantly asked about how her backyard was still lively and green even during the worst leaf-shedding times of trees.

Leslie attentively entered the rundown site where used to be Tucker Park in its glory, carefully stepped over the construction remains and pieces of broken glass and arrived next to the only remaining tree in the park where a tire swing used to be. She closed her eyes and wrapped her arms around the tree. She felt a faint breeze brush past her. When she opened her eyes the very next second, she was looking into the past in present time. The fountain was functional again, the trees were green, the benches were clean and steady. She stared at the sight with a smile on her face until she saw something from the corner of her eye. A guy dressed in a heavy, ripped coat despite the warm weather was up and running. Leslie Knope immediately ran after the guy, trying to stop him, trying to understand what was happening until she heard tires screeching and a loud crash sound.

“Oh my, oh my, I swear I didn’t see him, he just jumped before the car.” That was the first time Leslie Knope heard Ann Perkins after not hearing from her for more than a decade. “Leslie?”

“Oh hey, Ann.” Leslie replied like it was the most normal thing in the world, to see her best friend again after a decade just after she had hit a homeless guy. “Let me call an ambulance.”

“I’m a nurse.” Ann said as she fell down on her knees next to the motionless guy and tried to help, to no avail. It was also the last time Ann Perkins ever practiced as a nurse.

After giving her confession to Officer Dave Sanderson who kept trying to flirt with her long lost best friend, Ann Perkins gave up being a nurse and accepted to help Leslie with her newly opened JJ’s Waffle Haus and moved in next door to her just like old days.

During their adult slumber parties where they would go to one another’s apartment in pajamas and eat ice-cream while watching romantic comedies, Ann told about how her mother woke her up middle of the night and asked her to pack years ago, about how they moved from one town to another until they finally settled down in one town where her mother met a man with whom they moved in and who turned to be abusive. Leslie listened as Ann told about taking her mother and moving to a little town only a couple hours away from Coeur de Pawnee, away from the abusive boyfriend, about how she wanted to pursue a medical degree but could not afford, about how she started nursing school. Leslie kept listening to Ann as she cried while she told about falling in love with a patient and losing him and deciding to move back to Coeur de Pawnee. Leslie was crying too as she realized that her new beginning had started with hitting a homeless guy and killing him inadvertently.

Now years later, Ann Perkins was a partner and a waitress at JJ’s Waffle Haus with Leslie, still trying to learn more about the life of her best friend who was being elusive about some details of her life, such as the appearances of Ron Swanson and Leslie’s disappearances with him. She watched from the kitchen where she was avoiding Tom the cook as Leslie put on her blazer and left the diner after Ron.

Leslie Knope drove, following Ron’s truck. When they arrived at Ramsett Park, there was a raccoon party going on. Leslie walked side by side with Ron past the broken fluorescent tubes, dead leaves and broken swing sets. Among the trash bags on the muddy ground, a body was lying face down with something that appeared to a pink plastic bag wrapped around its head. Leslie could see it was a man.

“The police don’t know about this yet and I don’t want them to find out until we figure out what has happened before I get into jeopardy for having a dead guy in one of my parks.”

“What happened here?” Leslie asked as she started moving around the body, carefully avoiding the mud. Leslie Knope looked intently, unaware that she had stopped breathing for a moment. She was haunted by the body of the anonymous man lying before her. She just didn’t know why.

“We are going to find that out.” Ron said under his mustache.

She hit something with her foot and found the object she hit among the trash. It was a calculator. “Calc-you-later,” she exclaimed, only to have Ron grunt. “Sorry, force of habit.”

“Somebody murdered this guy. I was supposed to work on this park to get it back to its glory but you know how much I hate working, especially on government projects. So now you will bring the park back to life and ask the guy who killed him and do your thing. We will find his murderer, let the authorities know and still have a park. It’s a win-win.”

Leslie let out an uneasy breath. “Alright, I’ll do it,” she nodded. “There is still the slightest chance that I might bring the dead love you have for government back to life when I bring the park back to life with you in it.”

Ron touched his mustache, nodded and ran away and got in his car.

Leslie adjusted her blazer, and took a deep breath as she looked at the dead body. His green and blue plaid shirt was ripped in places, his pants were muddy and in garbage and he was missing a shoe. She had the urge to find his missing shoe and put it to his foot á la Cinderella but decided against it. She knelt down and removed the plastic bag around his head.

The Waffle Maker found herself looking at the dead body, specifically at the dead face, of Ben Wyatt. The longer she looked at him, the worse she felt about standing in an empty, dead park staring at the dead body of Ben Wyatt who used to be the Teen Mayor from Porkridge who moved to Coeur de Pawnee a few years ago. There he was, lying in mud and thrash, his face pale, his lips purple and his thick brown hair covered in dust.

She heard a honk from the distance and remembered what to do. She ran to the nearest tree that was long dead. She looked down at her watch, waited for the hand that showed seconds to get to 12. She closed her eyes and wrapped her arms around the trunk and held tightly. When she opened them seconds later, the sun was shining brighter, birds were chirping, the leaves of the dead tree were all green, the swing set was colored in bright red, the grass was green and there were blooming daisies everywhere. Ramsett Park before her seemed to be the perfect park back when she was a kid. Among the daisies, she saw a figure moving.


	4. Chapter 3

**_Chapter 3_ **

It was the day that she had her biggest fight with her mother when Leslie Knope realized what her power was capable of.

Leslie Knope’s obsession with waffles came from her father. Robert Knope was the best waffle-maker in the whole planet in young Leslie’s mind and while kids her age were dreaming of becoming princesses or getting married when they grew up, Leslie was sure that she would open up her own waffle restaurant. Her dreams came true when she put in every penny she ever saved since she was a teenager and opened up JJ’s Waffle Haus in a small location on one of the busiest streets of Coeur de Pawnee. Yet she still came up short on bills and other payments.

JJ’s Waffle Haus had been open for six months and was already on the verge of bankruptcy. Ann Perkins, the beautiful ex-nurse, was helping Leslie in every way she can, working pro bono and even letting Leslie Knope auction her off just that one time for ‘Win A Date with Beautiful Ex-Nurse, now Waitress but still Beautiful Ann Perkins’ so that the diner could get some revenue.

So Leslie was grateful when her mother Marlene Griggs-Knope told Leslie that she had arranged a meeting for her with a potential investor. Leslie was ready to meet the potential investor at any time at the diner but was surprised when her mother Marlene Griggs-Knope told her that they were going to meet at a fancy restaurant for dinner and advised her to dress nicely.

Leslie was looking forward to her meeting with the potential investor and followed her mother’s instructions and was five minutes early at the restaurant she was to meet the potential investor. She was devastated to realize that her meeting was a date and the potential investor was a 65 year old widower.

Thus happened the biggest fight between the mother-daughter duo and Leslie Knope found herself walking aimlessly in the snow-covered streets of Coeur de Pawnee to calm herself down while hoping that her mother would not try to set her up again with guys older than even her own self. She stopped by a small area in a parking lot where used to be the smallest park in Indiana. After the tourist attraction vanished, the government stopped working on the park and left it to its own fate which was to be abandoned and lost among the cars that surrounded it. Even though the regular obese citizens of Coeur de Pawnee could not fit into the park, Leslie had always loved it.

She sat down on the broken bench in the park with her hands in the pockets of her red coat and closed her eyes. When she opened them, she saw something lying on the ground behind her. Upon closer inspection, she realized that it was rather someone. Scared and shocked, Leslie gripped the bench she was sitting on tightly, unable to move. Her heart was beating faster and faster. 

Leslie Knope was unaware of how time moved but two minutes later, two things were different. Firstly, the smallest park was back to how it was first opened: small yet lovely and green. And secondly and more importantly, the dead guy was very much alive and was looking at Leslie. Words were not forming in Leslie Knope’s brain. Yet she was able to see that even though there was a hole where his brain should have been, the once dead guy was saying words to her.

“Why did you bring me back? I wanted it to all end.”

“You killed yourself?” she finally was able to ask.

“Yes, and now I’ll do it again,” the guy said and looked for something on the ground. “What did you do with my gun? Give it back!” he shouted as he got on his feet and launched himself toward Leslie Knope. “Give me my gun back.”

Leslie sprang to her feet as well and tried to fight the guy off. He was holding her arms while still asking for his gun back which Leslie did not have. When she somehow got her arms free, she wrapped them around the guy to demobilize him, a trick she had learned many years ago at one of the community center's self-defense classes. She had no idea how powerful that trick would be when the guy fell dead in her arms in the middle of the smallest park in Indiana. 

She ran to the nearest pay-phone and called the police, leaving an anonymous tip informing that there was a guy who had killed himself in the smallest park in Indiana. She then ran home and took a long bath, while crying and avoiding the outside world, not even answering her next door neighbor beautiful ex-nurse who was probably visiting to ask about the meeting.

As she soaked herself in the tub, Leslie Knope was upset to think she had just brought someone back to life and then back to death by her touch, that the last time she had sex was with Mark Brendanawicz from whom she had leased JJ’s Waffle Haus when they were both drunk after the opening party of JJ’s Waffle Haus and that her last date had been with a guy who would still be older than her own father if he were alive. Yet now knowing the full extent of her power, she decided that she was no longer the biggest fan of intimacy.

And years later, she was in another park she had just brought back to life, running to the body of Ben Wyatt, kneeling on the spot which was covered in mud and trash just seconds before. Even though she had known of Ben Wyatt, that was the first time she was being in such a close proximity to Ben Wyatt who was Leslie Knope’s first celebrity crush as the country’s youngest mayor. And the once dead Teen Mayor was pretty much alive, slowly opening her eyes. He got startled upon seeing the Waffle Maker.

“Hi,” she said shyly. Though she was aware of the fact that she was running out of time, she always found it difficult to find the appropriate words to say to a person she had just brought back to life.

“Good lord, what’s happening?” he spoke. His voice was hoarse from lying on trash, dead for hours.

“I’m Leslie Knope, from JJ’s Waffle Haus. Do you know what is happening to you now?”

“I had the strangest dream. I dreamed I was being strangled with a plastic bag.” Ben Wyatt said as he brought himself to a sitting position.

“You were strangled to death with a plastic bag,” Leslie said in her politest voice, making sure he knew what exactly happened.

“Oh,” he gasped. “Where am I?”

“We are in Ramsett Park.” Leslie answered. “I have, well, you have less than two minutes so I’ll be quick. You were dead and I brought you back to life along with the park. Do you know who killed you so we can avenge your death?”

“I have no idea. I was asked to come here and I thought it was dumb to actually come here but I did and then I was strangled to death and then I opened my eyes and was looking at the sun but actually it was your hair.”

Leslie found herself blushing unwillingly. “That’s my shampoo, it makes my hair shinier,” she commented then cleared her throat and went back to business mode. “I’m sorry you got killed. Any last thoughts, wishes?”

Ben got on his feet, looked around, then looked back at Leslie who was standing before him. “I wish I had the courage to sit down at your section at JJ’s Waffle Haus.”

“You went there?” Leslie asked.

“Almost every week. You are the Waffle Maker,” Ben replied nervously.

“And you are Benji Wyatt, the Teen Mayor,” she said and looked down at her watch. “We have, well, you have less than a minute left.”

“Thank you Leslie, nobody has called me Benji since… well, since I was impeached. I missed being called that.”

“You were my first lo- my first crush… my first celebrity crush,” Leslie mumbled.

“And you were my last crush,” Ben said in an honest-to-god manner. “I want my first kiss with you to be my last kiss, is that weird?” Ben asked as he took a step forward to Leslie.

“No, that’s symmetrical.” Leslie replied shyly, with half a smile. She closed her eyes.

Ben’s minute was nearly over. He closed his eyes and leaned down towards the Waffle Maker. Leslie Knope’s lips went as far as they would go. She couldn’t will them to go any further.

“If you don’t want to kiss me, it’s okay,” Ben suggested as he looked at her.

“I do, I do…” Leslie exclaimed as she pulled away and from under her breath said a sentence that would change everything: “What if you didn’t have to be dead?”

A smile appeared on the face of the former Teen Mayor. “That would be preferable.” Ben Wyatt agreed.

Leslie stopped, looked around, then at her watch. The moment Ben had was already over. She didn’t see any other changes in the park or anyone dying. She let out the breath she didn't know she was holding.

“Nobody can know. Okay, go hide behind that tree,” she commanded and Ben smiled and followed her instruction. She moved around nervously, making sure there wasn’t anything around that suggested Ben’s existence. She didn’t hear Ron Swanson coming towards her.

“Knope, the park looks amazing!”

“Ah, yes,” she replied sheepishly.

“What happened to the guy? Who killed him?”

“What guy? I’ve never seen a guy, anytime, anywhere. There wasn’t a dead body, there were raccoons. I need to go to the bathroom, the whiz palace as I like to call it and I’ll see you at the Waffle Haus,” she rambled on and ran to the direction of her car.

Ron Swanson watched as a figure moved behind a tree. He grunted and screamed Leslie’s name at the top of his lungs as he saw the figure run towards Leslie’s car.


	5. Chapter 4

_**Chapter 4** _

Leslie Knope, or The Waffle Maker she was known as, had never strayed away from the town of Coeur de Pawnee because of her love for the town. Yet because of her dislike of her power, she had always run far away from the scenes of bringing parks to life with the dead in them along. That was until the night when she brought the Harvest Festival back to life and realized the consequences.

Ron Swanson had cried only twice in his life. Once when he was nine years old and was hit by his school bus. The second time was when Leslie Knope inadvertently killed Li’l Sebastian while trying to bring the Harvest Festival back to its glory.

Leslie Knope’s power was one that gave and also took. For every park and recreational activity she brought back to life, along with the dead in them, her power randomly took one life away, unless she sent the dead she brought to life back to death in a couple of minutes. The day of the Harvest Festival was the day Leslie Knope realized that she had also inadvertently killed her father when she was a little girl and guilt consumed her.

As she got lonelier and more of an introvert in her guilt, she made a promise to herself that she would never let the dead she had brought to life live beyond the two minutes they were given so as not to take anyone else’s life inadvertently ever again. She broke that promise for Teen Mayor Ben Wyatt.

“So let me get this straight. You hug things and bring dead parks back to life along with other dead things in them and help the Parks and Recreation department?” Ben asked as he sat opposite to Leslie at the booth at the back in the closed JJ’s Waffle Haus.

“That is it in a nutshell,” Leslie replied as she put more whipped cream in her coffee.

“What about the death avenger thing?”

“The what?”

Ben took a sip from his coffee that was too sweet for him. “You asked me who killed me so you could avenge my death,” he explained.

“That was a first for me,” Leslie replied. “I never brought a murdered person back to life before.”

Ben gave her his widest smile. “I feel special.”

Leslie smiled back, lowering her head. “I don’t make a living out of it, I promise. I live a simple life. I just make parks and help waffles. No, that sounded wrong, I make waffles and help parks, that’s all I do.”

They sat down in silence for a minute while Ben tried to process his thoughts. “So if I knew who killed me I wouldn’t be alive now? You would send me back to death?”

“Um, yes,” Leslie admitted. “It is not what I want though, it is just how it works. If something or someone I bring back to life stays alive in the park more than a couple of minutes, something or someone else dies.”

Ben Wyatt’s eyes grew large. “Somebody died because of me?”

“I don’t know, I didn’t see anything different,” Leslie said. She took a sip from her coffee. She had forgotten that part of her strange power during the rush of the moment of letting her first celebrity crush live.

“So do you do this often? How long have you been thinking about this?”

“Like thinking about bringing you back to life? It wasn’t premeditated, I was musing on the idea. I didn’t consider it before I did it, more like not did it.” She was rambling again. “I only help parks only when Ron asks me to do.”

“Isn’t Ron supposed to help parks himself since he is the director of the parks department and all?”

“He hates the government and all the work related to it and this is more convenient for him,” she answered. “I basically do his work for him.”

“So let me ask you something, one final thing.” Ben looked straight at her and Leslie felt that she couldn't look away. “When you do it, when you are supposed to send someone you brought back to life back to death, how do you do it?”

Leslie looked down. She never thought she would have to tell another soul about that. Her voice was low. “I hug them.”

“To death?”

“Essentially. That is why I’m not keen on hugs.”

Ben was surprised. He started laughing. “How can you be not keen on hugs? A hug can be an emotional Heimlich, it can bring your mood around.”

“My hugs are basically Heimlichs, they stop parks and people from being dead,” Leslie disagreed. “They just bring my mood down. “

“You haven’t been hugged properly before then,” he shrugged and took another sip from his coffee. “What is your stance on kissing then?” he asked with a smirk.

Leslie looked at him, trying not to believe her ears. “I’m sorry, I just started hearing really loud circus music in my head.”

They sat in silence for a while until Leslie suggested closing up shop for the night and going to her house for Ben to get cleaned up.

“What do you mean I can’t go back to my place? All my favorite plaid shirts are at my place!” Ben protested as Leslie drove.

“We can’t let anyone else know you aren’t dead. You were killed and you are supposed to remain dead, you don’t want your murderer to find out you aren’t dead and strangle you to death once again, right?”

“You used too many death-words in one sentence,” Ben said. “What about my roommates, how are they supposed to function as adults without me?”

“The Dwyer-Ludgate Ludgate-Dwyer unsynchronized swimming duo? I’m sure they’ll go back to eating turkey chili from empty litter boxes without you.”

Ben Wyatt’s roommates Andy Dwyer and April Ludgate were a young married couple who had decided to get married after a month of dating when Andy asked if April wanted to get married the next day and April shrugged and accepted. They were famous in Coeur de Pawnee as the Dwyer-Ludgate Ludgate-Dwyer unsynchronized swimming duo. Their personal swimming styles were completely different but when they were swimming together, even unsynchronized, they had brought a unique sense of style to the sport.

The couple was known to be immature and childish whereas they were admittedly being immature and avoiding responsibilities because adults were boring with boring jobs and boring lives and boring responsibilities. Ben Wyatt had agreed to move in with them because he was looking for a place to stay in Coeur de Pawnee and the Dwyer-Ludgate duo seemed harmless. Soon, more precisely the night he moved in, Ben made them buy cutlery and plates and stopped them eating food from containers that were not to be used by humans for eating.

“How do you know about that?” Ben raised an eyebrow upon Leslie’s suggestion.

“I don’t, I was just guessing,” Leslie said and was a little grossed at her prediction being the truth.

“So I can’t go back to my auditing job?”

“I suppose you can’t go back to your old boring auditing job,” Leslie confirmed as she parked her car in her driveway. “You are going to stay with me here until we solve your murder.”

She led him out of the car and through the backyard where she put some carrots into an empty container. “Come here Li’l Sebastian.”

“Li’l Sebastian?” Ben asked as an animal made its way towards them, albeit a little too slow. “Wasn’t the pony from Harvest Festival that died also named Li’l Sebastian?”

“For your information, it’s a mini horse, not a pony, and yes, he died and I brought him back to life. Ron was devastated without him,” Leslie explained. “He lives with me here.”

“I thought you didn’t bring things and people back to life that often.”

“I don’t," she shrugged. "It’s just the two of you.”

They walked into her house. “This is like a hoarder’s nightmare,” Ben commented as they made their way through the boxes and stacks of newspapers into the living room.

“I tend to attach myself to things because of my… of my talent,” Leslie tried to explain. “And it isn’t a nice thing to say for my house considering that you are wearing a ripped shirt and muddy pants yourself now.”

“You have a point there.”

“You use my bedroom and bathroom, there are clean towels. I’ll try to find something for you to wear. I’ll sleep here on the couch. And I’m sorry to be a bad host but I’m exhausted, after reviving a park and a person and all. My eyes are rolling back to my head.”

“It’s okay, thank you for today,” Ben said and then watched as Leslie lay down on the couch and was asleep within a minute. “I’d kiss you if you weren’t scared of it,” he whispered and made his way to the said bathroom.

Clean and in his boxers, Ben lay down on Leslie’s bed, in the unfamiliar room and contemplated how he came to lie down on Leslie’s bed in the unfamiliar room.

The facts were these: Ben Wyatt, born in Porkridge, Minnesota, was 34 years, 354 days, 10 hours and 22 minutes old when he moved to Coeur de Pawnee as an auditor. Ben Wyatt had run for mayor when he was 17 years, 49 weeks old and was elected mayor when he was 18 years, 3 weeks old. And he was impeached when he was 18 years, 16 weeks old when he had bankrupted his town. Young Ben Wyatt had lost respect from his family and friends and promised to himself that he would work hard every day to gain that respect back and hopefully run for another high-level government position again. He had arrived to Coeur de Pawnee with the hope of helping the government by auditing its budget and finding the source of its corruption. 1 year, and 3 months later he had found the source of the corruption.

“I found the source of corruption,” he had exclaimed as he looked up from his screen the moment he found the source of corruption. He only needed solid, tangible proof so he started looking.

Ben had made some friends in the government and also outside the government. He knew Leslie Knope’s partner Ron Swanson and had looked into his department while his search for corruption. There wasn’t anything suggesting corruption and his department was surprisingly actually one of the few successful departments in the government. His search for solid, tangible proof was what had made him go to Ramsett Park.

When he woke up in the morning, Ben Wyatt found a post-it attached to his bedside lamp that said “Please don’t leave the house.” He smiled to himself and put on the outfit the Waffle Maker had placed in the bathroom, happy that she had given him a plaid shirt albeit a size too large. Just when he opened the door to leave the house, he found someone standing on the other side of the door.

“You are not Leslie,” the woman exclaimed.

“I’m a friend of Leslie’s,” he uttered.

The woman sounded surprised. “I didn’t know she would bring men home. Does she hug you?”

Ben didn’t know how to answer that. “I just met her.”

“Hey, aren’t you that guy who would come to the Waffle Haus?” she asked. “I work there, I’m Ann Perkins. I wanted to check up on Leslie. She didn’t come back to work yesterday.”

“She was helping me,” Ben said. “She must be at work now, I was going there to see her.”

Sitting next to Ann in the car as she drove them to JJ’s Waffle Haus, Ben tried his best to avoid any questions to raise suspicion. When they entered, he immediately sat down in Leslie’s section for the first time ever, only to find Ron Swanson standing next to him the next moment.

“You look like I saw a ghost,” he muttered under his mustache, his tone scaring the former Teen Mayor.

“What?” was Ben’s only reaction.

“Leslie, is this the dead guy?” Ron asked.

“Let me explain,” Leslie came next to them and the three of them sat at the booth, Ben and Leslie looking uncomfortable while Ron looked at their discomfort with annoyance. “I asked him who killed him and he didn’t know who killed him.”

“She asked me but I didn’t know, I didn’t see the guy, he came from behind me,” Ben added.

“Do you know how stupid is this thing you did? You could get fired!” Ron shouted, then lowered his voice when he noticed people staring at him.

“You can’t fire me, you don’t even pay me,” Leslie tried to reason.

Ron took a deep breath. “This is a scandal waiting to happen. You can get caught, which you clearly will.”

“We are being really careful. He promised he’ll wear a wig when we are in public.”

“When did I promise that?” Ben asked back.

“So if he is alive now, who died then?” Ron cut them both.

Leslie looked away. “I don’t know, it’s a random, proximity thing.”

“Bitch, I was in the proximity.” Ron raised his voice.

Before anyone could realize what was going on, Ben Wyatt punched Ron Swanson square in the jaw.

“What did you do?” Leslie shouted as she looked at Ron Swanson on the ground and at Ben Wyatt with a mix of surprise and disgust on his face.

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry!” Ben apologized honestly, trying to help Ron to his feet.

“That was so hot,” Ann Perkins said as she stood by the bar, her hands covering her mouth. “I mean, that was horrible, what is happening here?”

Ron Swanson got to his feet, looked at Ben but did not say a thing. He gave Leslie a look that spoke a million words.

“Ron, I’m so sorry, I’ll talk to you later,” Leslie said as she grabbed Ben Wyatt’s covered arm and pulled him away from the booth, back to the kitchen. “Why did you do that? He is my partner.”

“He called you a bitch,” Ben tried to explain his actions.

“I’m trying to keep you away to avoid raising any questions and you go and punch Ron Swanson and raise all the questions. I asked you not to leave the house!” Leslie Knope raised her voice even though she did not like raising her voice. “He called me my second least favorite word but you didn’t really have to punch him.”

“It was like a gag reflex, I’m sorry, I promise I won’t punch anyone else for you in public,” Ben Wyatt rationalized his action.“Do you happen to have any ice for my hand?” he asked.

Leslie Knope handed an ice bag to Ben Wyatt while Ann Perkins and Tom Haverford watched them with smirks on their faces.


	6. Chapter 5

**_Chapter 5_**  
  
For all of his swagger, Tom Haverford never thought that he would one day end up being the cook of JJ’s Waffle Haus. He was the most stylish man in Coeur de Pawnee and after his green card marriage ended, Tom Haverford was sure that life would finally work out for him, especially after he met the only other guy in Coeur de Pawnee who had as much swagger as him. When Jean-Ralphio Saperstein offered to partner up with him to build Coeur de Pawnee’s first and only entertainment emporium after he got flushed with cash when a Lexus ran over him, Tom Haverford was sure that he would become a successful, amazingly dressed man by the end of that week. Only two months after Entertainment 720 opened, the company burned down to the ground, literally, when a fire broke in the building after a flame-thrower malfunction and so did Tom’s dreams.  
  
Unemployed and unable to get money from the insurance company for the fire, Tom Haverford entered JJ’s Waffle Haus after seeing the ‘help wanted’ sign and never left since he was also evicted from his house. He had been a cook doing everything but the waffles and also taking shelter in a small backroom ever since. The one great perk to his job, apart from the health and dental coverage, was working side by side with the beautiful ex-nurse Ann Perkins who kept turning him down day after day.  
  
“How amazing was that punch?” he exclaimed as Ann came into the kitchen after the Waffle Maker and the mysterious narrow-framed punch-throwing guy left JJ’s Waffle Haus. “The guy has no swag but he took Ron Fucking Swanson down.”  
  
“I know, it looked so hot!” the beautiful ex-nurse agreed. “I have seen him come and go here but have never seen him with Leslie before.”  
  
“Who is he?”  
  
“He is apparently a friend of Leslie’s, he was at her house this morning.”  
  
“Our girl is doing the nasty behind our backs. I am glad to call her my friend.” Tom Haverford said as he rang out the order.  
  
“I have never seen her with a guy before since I moved back. The last date she was on was with that hundred year old guy her mother set her up with,” Ann Perkins commented as she picked up the order. “She is full of mysteries, first she keeps disappearing with Ron Swanson and then she is hanging out with a guy who punches Ron Swanson. It seems like she loves secrets and wants to marry secrets and have half-human half-secret babies.”  
  
“She is the Waffle Maker, that’s like being a super hero in this town. With great power comes great responsibility. And secrets. Have you never read a comic in your life?”  
  
“You sound like a big nerd, Tom, it isn’t a good look for you.” Ann told Tom Haverford as she left the kitchen.  
  
At that exact moment on the other side of town, Leslie Knope was pacing around in her living room while Ben Wyatt was looking at her.  
  
“You are going to leave a trail on the floor,” he said. “I am sorry, I didn’t mean to punch Ron Swanson, I told you, it was like a gag reflex. He called you a bitch.”  
  
“And you punched him. In the middle of my diner.”  
  
“And I apologized!” he repeated himself for the fifteenth time since the said event took place. “And I am sorry I left the house though you told me not to, I just couldn’t stay here alone.”  
  
“Because it is a hoarder’s nest?” Leslie Knope asked angrily as she finally stopped and stood before Ben Wyatt.  
  
“No, because I didn’t want to stay away from you.”  
  
Leslie looked at Ben Wyatt who was looking right back at her from where he was sitting, unable to formulate a response. A rush of warmth enveloped her, eradicating her anger. She would later describe this feeling as joy. Just when she finally opened her mouth to say something she didn’t think about, there was a knock on her door.  
  
The Waffle Maker rushed to the door, only to find her partner Ron Swanson on the other side of the door holding a piece of red meat to the spot where Ben Wyatt had punched him.  
  
“Knope, I am ruining this wonderful piece of meat from Mulligan’s just because your dead-alive friend punched me. Yet I am willing put it behind us. I want to help you solve his murder.”  
  
“Thank you,” Leslie said but hesitated to invite him inside.  
  
Suddenly a figure appeared by their side. “Ron Swanson, I bring you the saddest news.”  
  
“Hello Chris,” Ron acknowledged Chris Traeger, the temporary Mayor of Couer de Pawnee though Chris Traeger didn’t seem to acknowledge Leslie Knope. Ron Swanson had a rare moment of gratitude for Chris Traeger’s inability to focus on more than one thing at once.  
  
“I was on my daily 10K when I saw you drive here,” he said. “Jerry Gergich of your Parks department sadly passed away. It is literally the worst news I have ever had. He was walking outside yesterday around noon next to Ramsett Park and had a fart attack.”  
  
Ron looked angrily at Leslie who glimpsed at Ben in the house sadly who bowed his head down in what felt like defeat.  
  
“He was old. And like everything he was to die. And this makes me think about my own mortality. And this makes me sadder than humanly possible. I’m going to finish my daily 10K now,” he said. “Ron, great job on Ramsett Park though, it is literally the best looking park in this wonderful town.” he added and left as suddenly as he first appeared.  
  
“Dammit Jerry!” Ron exclaimed. “It just had to be him.”  
  
“I’m so sorry Ron,"  Leslie said, inviting Ron in. "This is my fault.”.  
  
“We need to find out who killed your friend.” Ron suggested.  
  
“Ben. My name is Ben.”  
  
“It is of no importance, Dead Boy,” Ron said as he sat down opposite to him. “We need to solve your murder so Jerry’s death will not be in vain. And yours too.”  
  
Leslie joined them. “Ben doesn’t know who killed him, how are we supposed to find it out?”  
  
“Son, did you have any enemies, anyone who wanted to harm you?” Ron Swanson asked.  
  
“I received at least a dozen death threats ever since I moved to Coeur de Pawnee because I wanted to cut down the town budget. I guess you can say yes, I had enemies.”  
  
“Then we need names, phone numbers and motives,” The Waffle Maker exclaimed. “It is a start point. I'll prepare a binder!”  
  
“You are the numbers robot guy, right? You wanted to gut the government’s budget with a machete," Ron said with a glimpse of a smile that scared Ben Wyatt. "I am a big admirer.” 

“Surprisingly you were the only one who supported me.” Ben Wyatt concurred.  
  
“Let’s start within the government, we need a list of names of everyone whose budgets you wanted to slash,” Ron suggested. “I had ‘slash it’ banners I was bringing to the meetings, I still keep them in my trunk.”  
  
“I remember very well, you were quite cheery,” Ben replied. “Leslie, do you mind doing this? I know you have a diner to run.”  
  
“I brought you back to life and kept you alive so it is my responsibility to find out who is responsible for taking your life. And Jerry's by proxy.” The Waffle Maker said as she joined Ron Swanson and Ben Wyatt.  
  
Two hours later, they were writing on the last page of a legal pad.  
  
“Son, this is a lot of enemies.”  
  
“There were too many things to cut,” Ben offered. “Leslie, you know everyone in this town, you can go through the list and take out who are harmless.”  
  
“I can’t think of anyone in this town who would want to murder someone,” The Waffle Maker said and added. “Half of the town cannot even get off from their couches, let alone murder you. How about something you were doing recently that pissed somebody off?”  
  
“I was working on the sanitation department just before I was killed.” Ben suggested.  
  
“I’ll go question Sewage Joe, you two stay here.”  
  
Ron Swanson left the Waffle Maker and the Teen Mayor alone and silence filled the room. Leslie looked at Ben Wyatt and the legal pad before them. “I’m going to make color-coordinated binders for these so that we can find out the killer more easily,” she suggested, to break the silence and walked to the heap of folders she was keeping in the next room with Ben Wyatt’s eyes on her. She brought five binders and left them on the coffee table. “I’m going to make some waffles.”  
  
“I’ll help.” Ben Wyatt said and followed her to the kitchen. Leslie already had the ingredients ready and was trying to reach for her favorite waffle iron on the overhead cupboard. Ben Wyatt came behind her and reached, over, almost touching her hand. Leslie immediately pulled her hand away and herself and the iron fell on the floor, between them.  
  
“Don’t touch me!” she chimed. “I’m allergic to fingers.”   
   
Ben Wyatt looked at her, puzzled. “No, you are not,” he protested.  
  
“No, I’m not,” she admitted, looking up to him. “But I don’t know the full extent of my power. No, it’s not a power. It’s a… it’s… my thing. I can touch you and kill you. Again.”  
  
“I’m sorry, it won’t happen again.” Ben uttered sincerely and bent to pick the iron up. He was glad it wasn’t broken. “Here,” he said as he extended the iron, not keeping his eyes away from her.  
  
Leslie did not break his gaze as she reached out and picked the other end of the iron. She thought how strangely funny it was that there would always be a physical barrier between them and now that barrier was one object she loved the most. Then started with the waffles.


	7. Chapter 6

**_Chapter 6_ **

At this very moment, Leslie Knope laid awake in her bed, just adjacent to the guest room where the Teen Mayor Ben Wyatt was sleeping. After two days of investigation into his murder, they had come to a dead end when they looked into all the departments in the government of Coeur de Pawnee and were unable find anything. She did not want to call what they were facing a dead end in order not to disrespect Ben Wyatt who had been dead himself for a night only a few days ago, she pretended that it was just another obstacle.

She laid awake thinking whether the Teen Mayor was able to dream and if he was, what he was dreaming of. She pondered whether his dreams were different now that he had been dead once and not anymore. She thought if the dead dreamed and if yes, what a person who had come back from the death dreamed about. And also how they felt about coming back from the death. Her thinking came to a pause when the man she was thinking about started knocking on her door lightly, calling out her name softly.

She grabbed her robe and put it on before walking to open the door. Ben Wyatt was standing on the other side of the door. Even in the darkness of her apartment, she could see the concern on his face.

“I’m sorry if I woke you up, I couldn’t sleep,” he whispered.

“I wasn’t sleeping,” she replied. “And you don’t have to whisper.”

“I just can’t sleep, it’s horrible.”

Leslie turned the light switch on and they both squinted their eyes, trying to adjust to the light. “Wanna Boggle?” she suggested and Ben Wyatt gave her a curious look. “It’s an entertaining and educative game.”

“Sure, why not?” He smiled and took a step aside, giving way to the Waffle Maker. He watched as she entered into the room he was sleeping in and came out in a few seconds holding the box game. He followed her downstairs slowly, making sure he was at least two steps behind her. After the incident with the waffle iron, Leslie had come to his room with a binder she had prepared on their housing arrangement. One section listed a number rules to avoid physical contact which included not drinking because she thought they wouldn’t be able to control their movements intoxicated and he could touch her by mistake and die. He promised her that she would follow the instructions carefully and so far had been successful at it.

He had never been to the Waffle Maker this close in his life. Whenever he went to JJ’s Waffle Haus, he would sit at the farthest table from Leslie’s section but now even living under the same roof, he felt very distant to her. He had thought that after coming back to life thanks to the arms of Leslie Knope, he was given a second chance that he would use to be with her, but coming back to life thanks to arms of Leslie Knope was keeping them physically apart. He did not mind it though, being in the proximity of her, talking to her about stuff was enough for him.

He sat down cross-legged on the floor opposite to Leslie Knope in the middle of her living room with a smile. He couldn’t help but look at her naked legs and red-painted toenails momentarily and hoped that he didn’t offend her somehow by being only in his boxers and a shirt. He also noted that he needed more clothes since he didn’t want to be in the clothes he was killed in anymore even though Leslie had washed them twice. He would talk to her about it later.

“You know the rules so I don’t need to repeat them. Let me grab some pencils and paper.” Leslie excused herself and moved away immediately in order to prevent him from seeing her blush. They were in the middle of her living room in their sleepwear. Given that they were unable to touch, the last thing she wanted was to lust over the Teen Mayor’s skin. She told herself to get a grip before returning to the living room with the pencils and notepads and was relieved to see Ben under the blanket she usually kept on her couch.

“It’s cold.” Ben explained before she could even ask.

Leslie Knope realized that she had finally found a worthy opponent for Boggle after two hours when they were at a draw. She was tired and had a diner to open in the morning but she simply did not want to go to bed.

“Do you want to call this a draw?" Ben suggested. "Otherwise we will be up all day trying to win.”

“Yes, please,” Leslie answered and put down her pencil and paper. “So, how do you feel?” she asked, wanting to learn more about Ben Wyatt. She had known all about him when he was the Teen Mayor but did not know much about the adult Ben Wyatt with whom she was sharing her house.

“I’m not cold anymore,” he said and saw Leslie give him a look. “Oh, you mean how I feel? About not being dead and all?” he asked to clarify and she nodded. “It’s strange. I mean, I had no idea I’d die in the first place. Then you came and here I am.”

“How was experiencing death like?” she asked, her blue eyes staring into his brown.

“Not pleasant,” he responded immediately. “It was a little painful, being killed. It’s why I can’t sleep. The moment I fall asleep, I feel someone is trying to suffocate me and I wake up immediately.”

“I’m so sorry to hear that,” Leslie said, wishing she could reach over to touch him to console him.

“Don’t feel sorry, it’s thanks to you I’m alive. Leslie, I don’t think I actually really thanked you,” he said. “Thank you, Leslie. You saved my life. Literally.”

Her smile was bright. “My pleasure.”

“Why did you do that?” Ben asked. “I mean, keeping me alive? Jerry had to die because of me.”

Leslie was silent for a few seconds, kept her head down. “I just thought my world would be a better place if you were in it,” she muttered shyly and faked a yawn. “I’m heading to bed, I’m so sleepy,” she added as she got on her feet.

“Sure, you need to go to work,” Ben said. He faked a yawn himself and dropped his blanket.

Leslie got a glimpse of his abdomen when he was stretching to yawn. “You are not perfect!” 

“Excuse me?” Ben asked, curious.

“Your scar.“ Leslie pointed. “That is the little scar you got when you were nine and you fell off your bike!” she stated all too confidently.

Ben just looked at her, feeling a mix of terror and amazement. He wondered to himself why it was always a mix. “You know?”

“I did watch your national TV meltdown, yes,” she simply said and added. “Cindy Eckhart had just turned you down for prom. You almost called her on the show.”

Ben laughed nervously. “I feel so embarrassed.”

“Don’t be!” she reassured her and wished for a second time in one night that she could hug him or at least pat him on the shoulder because from the look on his face, it was obvious that he still carried the weight of his short political career. “Not everyone becomes a mayor at 18 and then have a meltdown on national TV after they are impeached, consider yourself special.”

“I didn’t think like that back then. Thank you, I appreciate it,” he said. “Anyways, have a good night Leslie. And thanks for tonight. And for everything.”

He lingered a little longer in the living room after Leslie excused herself to her bedroom and tried to catch his breath. She knew of his teen political career and quoted his exact words and was still talking to him. She was not embarrassed of his past failures. He had had a crush on her ever since he saw her sitting on the bench before the wildflower mural in the city hall and now that crush was turning into something even bigger. And now he was staying in her house, sleeping just in the adjacent bedroom and was so close to her but that was the closest he could get. The former Teen Mayor didn’t remember a time he felt happier than that moment.


	8. Chapter 7

**_Chapter 7_**  
  
“Honey, where is Ben?” Andy Dwyer asked his wife of one year. Their internet was down and usually their roommate Ben would fix it within the ten minutes it was down and it had been three days and the internet was still down and the dishes in the sink were as dirty as Andy had left them.  
  
“I don’t know, maybe he is shacking up with his gay lover,” April suggested as she came into the room and sat cross-legged on the sofa next to her husband. “We are out of milk.”  
  
“Honey, he is not gay,” Andy said as he pulled her close to him and placed a peck on her cheek. “And even if he was, which I know he is not because I know things, he would tell us if he was going to disappear for days.”  
  
“If you are so worried about him, go look for him and have his gay babies.” April suggested nonchalantly.  
  
“I shall,” Andy replied, jumping to his feet. “You are a genius, honey. This is just the case for Burt Macklin.” He tried to do a somersault but instead felt face forward and his legs smashed into their cheap coffeetable, breaking it into pieces. “I’m okay.”  
  
“Be careful, we won’t be able to do this week’s show because of you!” April scoffed. After a break of six months spending Ben’s money, the Dwyer-Ludgate Ludgate-Dwyer unsynchronized swimming duo was back to do a show in the upcoming weekend. She didn’t say it out loud but April wanted Ben to be back because he had promised he would watch the show from the front seat. And also she wanted to get fifty bucks from him to buy a more expensive waterproof hair gel.  
  
“I’ll be there at that show. With my trunks. With or without Ben. But first I need to wash my trunks in bubble bath.” Andy declared as he went to Ben’s bedroom. The bed was unmade and his laptop was still on. There was a coffee mug on his desk that was going moldy. He checked the laptop’s screen to see what his roommate was working on before he disappeared and after getting bored with the notes and numbers on the screen, he instead turned on a game of solitaire.  
  
On the other side of Couer de Pawnee, Ben Wyatt walked into the kitchen to find Leslie Knope gone, a waffle already cold waiting for him on the table with a note: Have a nice day. Ron said he’d drop by. DON'T LEAVE THE HOUSE!  
  
Just moments after he was done with his waffle and the dishes, there was a knock on the kitchen door. Ben Wyatt let Ron Swanson in who had confided in him that he loved riddles and solving a murder was almost like solving a riddle for him.  
  
“Son, were you working on something else that would threaten somebody?” Ron Swanson finally asked the one question that had been bugging him for days. He felt like the Dead Boy was hiding something from him.  
  
“Yes.” The answer was simple. He did not want to talk anyone about his side project that was likely what had gotten him killed in the first place.  
  
“Dead Boy, you need to tell me what you were up to. For your own sake. For Leslie’s sake. The people who killed you are still out there. They did it once, I am sure they won’t hesitate again. And this time  
it is not just you, but Leslie Knope is in this as well. I do not agree with Leslie most of the time and I might like solving murder mysteries but that does not mean that I would enjoy solving her murder.”  
  
“You are in this, too,” Ben added but Ron Swanson simply shook his head. “I do not want Leslie to be in any trouble. But I am not sure how to say this. There was a reason why I came to Couer de Pawnee. Do you know my past?”  
  
“I don’t know and I don’t care,” Ron replied. “I do not care about other people’s personal lives. I had a colleague I worked with for three years and never learned his name. Best friend I’ve ever had.”  
  
“Wow, that’s… encouraging,” Ben said. “I came to Couer de Pawnee to solve the corruption. It took me a year and three months to find the source of the corruption. I was in that park that night to meet an anonymous source who was going to give me the concrete evidence I needed. Then the next thing I know, I was looking at Leslie. ”  
  
The facts were these: Unbeknownst to him, while looking into corruption in the government of Coeur de Pawnee, Ben Wyatt had also made some enemies both in the government and outside the government. There were some people who were against the research Ben Wyatt was doing on the government of Coeur de Pawnee’s corruption. And those were some powerful enemies.  
  
The candy maker company of Coeur de Pawnee called Bittersweetums was also the richest family in Coeur de Pawnee, if not the most powerful. They had made their wealth through making candy and providing jobs to the city and also through making sure the government of Coeur de Pawnee supported their wealth. They had friends in high places and their friends at those high places made sure that Newports, the family behind the company, were able to put other friends to other high places.  
  
“So the Newports are responsible for your death?”  
  
“Probably, I think,” Ben agreed. “I had found dirt on then. Nobody would believe me and the dirt without proof because they run this town.”  
  
“We need that proof. Now!” Ron exclaimed, jumping to his feet. “Does Leslie know this?”  
  
“No, I didn’t tell her. Bittersweetums provide the candy she has in her diner,” he answered. “She would be devastated.”  
  
Ron insisted. “She needs to know that you and Jerry died because of them, son.”   
   
Ben ran his hands through his hair, letting out an uneasy laugh. He found himself nodding. “Alright, I will. Tonight.”  
  
“Good.” Ron gave one of those grins that made Ben completely uncomfortable. “Now, if you will excuse me, I’ll go home and eat some bacon and drink some scotch while watching ‘The Bridge on the River Kwai’.”  
  
“Why, is it your birthday?” Ben asked.  
  
Ron Swanson eyes grew wider and he groaned. “Who told you that?”  
  
“No, nobody told me that,” Ben mumbled, scared. “I just made a guess.”  
  
“I don’t like people having personal information on me,” Ron Swanson said and pointed his finger at Ben. “Do not tell anyone what you know.”  
  
“I… I won’t!” Ben stuttered. “Happy birthday,” he said under his breath but looking at Ron’s face, he hoped Ron didn’t hear it.  
  
Following Leslie’s instructions and not wanting to cause further trouble, Ben decided to stay at the house until Leslie returned. He decided to watch some TV but watching murders and mayhem on TV did not seem to be a suitable pastime given he was murdered himself only a few days ago.  
  
Sitting alone on a couch eating soup didn’t make time go faster. He didn’t know when Leslie was coming back. He decided go around the house, looking at all the items the Waffle Maker had in her house.  
  
He did not want to make the same mistake and admit Leslie was a hoarder but in truth, she quite was. One corner of her living room was completely filled with stacks of newspapers, the oldest stack dating back to the 70s.  
  
Trying to get one of the stacks with more recent dates, he hit and dropped one box. Ben Wyatt kneeled to pick up the box, only to notice a smaller box next to it. Curiosity got the best of him and he opened it, only to find himself staring into the face of his 18 year old self on the cover of a magazine. He lifted the box and brought it to the couch and started emptying out its contents. Ben Wyatt surprised to find clippings of his short time as the mayor of his hometown. He never knew if anyone actually had these, he was astonished to realize that Leslie Knope actually had them and kept them. Even his parents had gotten rid of the newspapers long before his college graduation.  
  
Below the two copies of a major magazine with his face on the cover with a headline saying ‘Young and Reckless – The Story of how Ben Wyatt Became The Youngest and Shortest-Termed Mayor Ever’, Ben Wyatt found a yearbook. It took him only seconds to realize who it belonged to. Under her photo, a black and white photo where she was giving a wide, earnest smile, there was a quote from Eleanor Roosevelt. He looked at the photos, discovering how Leslie was not only a member but also a founder of more than five clubs and was nominated ‘the best likely to become the first female president’ and felt his heart pang. It was amazing to see the woman he liked as a teenager.  
  
He heard keys turning and he instinctively tried to close the box and put it back to its place, but did not account for the box opening at the bottom, all of its contents scattering around on the living room floor. He felt himself caught red-handed when the Waffle Maker entered the living room and looked first at him, then at the floor.  
  
“I thought I was being sneaky by trying to hide that,” she said before moving to collect the scattered magazines.  
  
“I’m sorry, I didn’t want to intrude your privacy," Ben admitted. "I was bored.” He tried to help pick up the pieces of clutter.  
  
“It’s fine,” Leslie uttered, looking at Ben. She waited for him to put the magazines back into the box before following suit in order to avoid accidental touching.  
  
“I can’t believe you have these,” Ben told her, looking into her eyes, not breaking contact.  
  
Leslie felt herself getting embarrassed and exposed. It was true that she had followed the Teen Mayor’s short but important political career intently when she was a teenager and had the biggest crush on him. Having the said Teen Mayor in her house, having him look at her the way he was looking at her was undoing her. She felt like she was a teenager for a second. The more she spent time with him, she felt the crush she had on Teen Mayor Benji Wyatt turn into a crush on the now adult Ben Wyatt. To break the tension, she immediately took the box in her arms and carefully put it back to its place.  
  
After dinner, they were sitting opposite to each other in the living room. Ben Wyatt was reading the day’s newspaper for a change to get himself ready to tell Leslie the truth while she was making a shopping list. Ben saw a small ad.  
  
“Good lord!” he exclaimed. “My roommates. I forgot.”  
  
His short sentences did not make any sense to Leslie Knope. “What about your roommates?” she asked.  
  
“The Dwyer-Ludgate Ludgate-Dwyer show is this weekend. I had promised them that I’d be there.”  
  
“Ben, we can’t. It’s going to be their biggest show, it’s going to be crowded,” Leslie said softly. “We can’t risk it, your murderer might be there.”  
  
“I know the risk, Leslie,” Ben replied. “They are my friends. I didn’t even let them know that I… died. They must be worried about me. And I promised them.”  
  
“Ben…” Leslie pleaded.  
  
“I will wear a wig or a costume, like you suggested to Ron,” he said. “I have front-seat tickets. Well, had. They are in my drawer at my desk at the City Hall.”  
  
Leslie remained silent for a few seconds, thinking. She knew the risk but also tried to put herself in Ben’s shoes. He had simply dropped off from his own life, seeing some old familiar faces would do him good. And to be honest, she was really looking forward to the comeback show of The Dwyer-Ludgate Ludgate-Dwyers. She had always loved a good comeback story.  
  
“Okay,” she said with a smile.  
  
Ben smiled back. “If I could, I would hug you now,” he said.  
  
Leslie looked at him and with a wider smile, she hugged herself, pretending to hug him. At that very moment, Ben was hugging himself, pretending to hug her, too.


	9. Chapter 8

_**Chapter 8**  
  
_ Keeping Ben Wyatt a secret from her best friend, the beautiful ex-nurse Ann Perkins was one of the hardest things Leslie Knope ever had to do in her life. It seemed even harder than keeping her strange power secret from everyone.  
  
Ever since he had come to her diner with Ann Perkins and punched Ron Swanson, Ben Wyatt was all Ann Perkins was curious about. She would try to corner Leslie, asking all sorts of questions about him: _When did they start going out? When did he move in? Was she aware of his presence when he would come to the diner for lunch every week? Was his hair always styled like that? Where did he learn to throw a punch like the one he threw on Ron Swanson? How did he manage to manage odd colored plaid shirts with skinny ties and still look stylish?_ The last question was actually from Ton Haverford who seemed to be as interested in Ben Wyatt as her best friend was.  
  
Leslie had been trying to keep silent on the subject of Ben Wyatt and was keeping him out of sight, hidden her house. She had forgotten that her best friend also was going to The Dwyer-Ludgate Ludgate-Dwyer show. She was in line with Ben who was wearing sunglasses and a bandana as part of his disguise, and was out of excuses about the presence of Ben Wyatt in her life when her best friend beautiful ex-nurse Ann Perkins approached them.  
  
“Leslie, what a surprise!" Ann greeted the duo. "You didn’t tell me you were coming to the show.”   
   
“Oh, hi Ann," she greeted her friend back with a little hesitance. "I didn’t know you’d be here”   
   
“And who is this?” Ann asked.  
  
“This is my nephew… Torpel.” Leslie made up a name and realized immediately that she was failing miserably at lying. Ann gave her a look. “That’s not a name. I don’t have a nephew.” Leslie took a deep breath. “This is Ben Wyatt.”  
  
“Hi Ben Wyatt, we meet again.” Ann shook hands with him. “The bandana and the sunglasses are a nice touch.”  
  
“Yeah, I wanted to give off a summer vibe,” Ben lied, too. “Nice seeing you again.”  
  
“So, we should get to our seats!” Leslie chimed in. “I’ll see you inside, Ann,” she said and cleared her throat in an attempt to usher Ben away from Ann. As much as she loved her best friend and wanted to spend time with her, she hated lying to her and the more she kept her in the presence of Ben Wyatt, the more she had to lie.  
  
Ben led Leslie to their front row seats and sat down. He looked around to see anyone suspicious but didn’t see anyone looking at him except from Ann Perkins on the opposite side of the pool. He did not see the pair of eyes that was looking at him.  
  
Inside their dressing room, from a window overlooking the crowd, April Ludgate was looking at the audience with a smile on her face that she tried to hide. “Babe, he kept his promise!” she called out to Andy who was still trying to open the hair gel jar.  
  
“Who?”  
  
“Ben. He is there, right where he promised he’d be. And he is actually sitting next to that waffle lady he is obsessed with.”  
  
“Are you serious?” Andy rushed to April’s side and leaned to see where April was pointing. “It’s really him. And the Waffle Maker from JJ’s Waffle Haus. Why is he wearing sunglasses?”  
  
April didn’t answer Andy’s question immediately since she was happy to see Ben despite his ridiculous outfit. “See, you were worried for nothing, he was busy shacking up the waffles lady,” she told Andy who nodded in agreement.  
  
“Let’s go!” Andy said and cannonballed into the swimming pool, starting their show.  
  
Another pair of eyes was watching the Waffle Maker and the Teen Mayor who was supposed to be dead. He nodded, pretended to watch as the Dwyer-Ludgate Ludgate-Dwyer duo swam to one another from opposite ends of the pool and secretly took photos of Leslie Knope and Ben Wyatt in disguise.  
  
At the end of the show, Leslie Knope felt her hands aching from all the clapping she did. The show was spectacular and it felt like the duo had gotten even better and more unsynchronized during their hiatus. Next to her, Ben Wyatt was also applauding wildly, appreciating her former roommates.  
  
"We should go to the backstage." Leslie leaned over to Ben and whispered. "They were incredible and you should go celebrate them. And tell them where you have been the last week."  
  
Ben was taken aback. "Are you sure? Isn't that against our rules?"  
  
"Ben, we are already against the rules by being here. They are your friends, you should be with them now."  
  
A wide grin crept on the former Teen Mayor’s face. "Thank you, Leslie."  
  
He led her behind some doors and through some corridors and Leslie knew that it wasn't the first time he had been to a Dwyer-Ludgate Ludgate-Dwyer show even though he didn't admit to liking them.  He stopped before a door and looked at Leslie. "Are you sure, Leslie? We can't go back after this."  
  
Instead of replying, Leslie Knope knocked on the door and opened it.  
  
"Ben, dude!" Leslie heard a voice shouting and the next thing she knew, Ben Wyatt was wrapped in a bear hug by Andy Dwyer. "So psyched that you are here." Leslie moved around them in order to avoid being wrapped into a hug herself and entered into the darkly lit room. "April, honey, look who is here!" he shouted back, letting Ben go.  
  
"Cool, whatever." April shrugged, not lifting her head as she toweled her hair.  
  
"Ben, who is this?" Andy asked, still holding Ben through the arm, as they moved together to where Leslie was standing. "Not to disrespect because you are my friend and she is your lady-friend, but I'd totally hit that."  
  
Leslie couldn't believe her ears and was even more surprised when she heard April. "So would I."  
  
"April, Andy, this is my..." he paused and looked at Leslie. “This is Leslie Knope, she is the owner of JJ's Waffle Haus."  
  
"She is the Waffle Maker, duh." April commented. "Where the hell have you been the last week? We ran out of milk. And clean dishes."  
  
Leslie sat down on the one chair that was not cluttered with clothes. Ben sat down next to April on the couch and Andy sat down on the tiny space between April and Ben. "That's why I actually came over," Ben started. "But first things first: you two were amazing out in the pool."  
  
"We know. Where were you?" April demanded.  
  
Ben didn't know how to begin so he looked at Leslie Knope for encouragement. "Something terrible happened to Ben," she said, speaking for the first time since they entered the room.  
  
"I, uh, I got in some trouble." Ben stammered.  
  
"Did you get caught stealing money from Leslie?" Andy cut in.  
  
"No, Andy, no. I got... I got killed."  
  
Andy and April just looked at him as if they were waiting more on the story.  
  
"Somebody murdered me last week in Ramsett Park. Leslie saved me," he said. He didn't want to give specifics on how Leslie saved him. He wasn't sure they would understand.  
  
"Dude, shut up! That's awesomesauce!" Andy exclaimed.  
  
Ben was astounded. He had thought about various reactions but that was not one reaction he had expected. "Andy, how is that awesomesauce? Somebody tried to kill me… killed me."  
  
"You are here and alive, so that's what makes the sauce so awesome."  
  
April agreed. "Yeah, you don't look dead to me." Her tone didn't giving any indication as to how she felt. Yet as Leslie looked at her, for a brief second she could see April looked genuinely sad as Ben spoke about being killed.  
  
Ben continued to explain. “So, um, I have been staying with Leslie to hide.”  
   
“More like shacking up,” April commented in her usual sarcastic tone.  
  
Leslie mumbled under her breath. “I can assure you, there has been no touching.” Nobody heard her.  
  
“Anyways. So, over the next few days, if anyone asks about me, just say you don’t know. Don’t tell anyone about where I am or what I told you. Can I trust you on that?” Ben asked in desperation.  
  
“Of course, buddy, you can count on us.” Andy said as he pulled the Teen Mayor into another bearhug with his wife. After saying their goodbyes, the former Teen Mayor followed Leslie to her car.  
  
“There is a 30% chance they’ll both spill out my secret,” Ben told Leslie as he opened the door to the backseat. Leslie’s rules had included Ben not to sit in the front seat in case something happened so he was following that. “But I am glad I told them, I feel relieved that my friends know what happened. Well, not exactly the whole story, but still.”  
  
“I am glad you saw them,” Leslie said as she turned on the engine. “Their show was amazing.”  
  
“Yes, it was. Thank you again, Leslie. Thank you so much.”  
  
The Waffle Maker met the Teen Mayor’s eyes through the rear-view mirror. “You are much welcome!” she replied as she hit the gas pedal. The gas pedal would not be the only thing Leslie Knope would hit as a dark figure suddenly appeared before the car and hit the hood of the car. The sound of screeching brakes was the only sound in the empty parking lot.


	10. Chapter 9

_**Chapter 9**_  
  
When he was nine years, thirteen weeks old, Ben Wyatt was playing husband to his next door neighbor Cindy Eckhart. From where he was lying on the grass, Cindy’s blonde hair shone in the sun, giving an effect of a halo, proving Ben’s hypothesis that she was an angel.  
  
Cindy held out her arm for Ben to hold to lift himself up, but instead Ben pulled her down and she fell atop him. Ben was laughing, unable to believe the fact that his crush was lying on him while Cindy Eckhart was hitting him with closed fits and screaming. The happiest moment in young Ben Wyatt’s life was the worst in Cindy Eckhart’s. She jumped to her feet and ran to her house, and Ben Wyatt did not talk to her again until he became the mayor of his town and asked her to the prom, only to be turned down.  
  
“Good lord.”  
  
Leslie held her breath and looked at Ben from the rearview mirror who was looking outside. She had just hit someone. She unfastened her seatbelt and got out of the car immediately to do something. She ran and found a woman lying on the ground. All the bad possibilities popped to her mind. Squinting her eyes, she tried to see Ben in the car through the headlights.  
  
“I’m sorry, Leslie. I should have looked where I was going,” came the voice of Shauna Malwae-Tweep. Leslie Knope finally let out the breath she was holding. Before she knew it, there were voices coming around her and figures stepped in.  
  
“I’m a nurse, let me through!” Ann Perkins shouted as she made way and knelt beside Shauna.  “Okay, can you sit up?” She helped Shauna up. “Follow my light. Not with your whole head, just your eyes.”  
  
Leslie moved closer to the car. Ben was already out of the car, looking at the scene from behind the crowd.  
   
Ann was still doing her examination. “How many fingers am I holding?”  
  
“Ben, stay behind,” Leslie whispered to Ben Wyatt. The last thing she wanted after hitting the city’s nosiest journalist with her car and causing a scene was bringing the attention to Ben.  
  
“She is okay, nothing here to see people!” shouted Ann Perkins as she helped Shauna Malwae-Tweep stand and lean on the hood of the car that had just hit her moments ago.  
  
“Is she going to be okay? Ann talk to me. Is she okay?” Leslie rushed the beautiful ex-nurse. “Are you okay?”  
  
“It’s nothing major, just some bruises. You were really lucky Shauna.”  
  
“Thank you, Ann Perkins.” Shauna smiled her bright smile at the ex-nurse. “And Leslie, I am sorry for causing you trouble.”  
  
“There is no need to apologize Shauna, I am sorry for hitting you.”  
  
“Oh my, is that Ben Wyatt?” Shaun Malwae-Tweep pointed at the Teen Mayor who was standing behind Leslie in the dark. “I haven’t seen you in days.”  
  
Ben Wyatt shyly stepped out of the dark and walked towards Shauna. “Hi Shauna.”  
  
Leslie Knope remained in her place by the car, looking as Ben Wyatt and Shauna Malwae-Tweep fell into a familiar conversation. Something broke in her as she watched Shauna touch Ben’s shoulder.  
  
“What is going on, Leslie?” Ann Perkins came over.  
  
“They are going to have sex in five minutes,” replied the Waffle Maker, confusing both Ann Perkins and herself.  
  
“I don’t think so, Leslie,” Ann commented. “They are simply catching up. Like you and I should.”  
  
Leslie looked at her friend and gave a half smile, nodding her head. “I’ll tell you everything, I promise. But not right now.” She went back to watching Ben and Shauna. Shauna’s hand was now on Ben’s wrist, she was laughing at something he said. Just the slightest act of her hand touching his skin almost made her cry. “I know how this works. She smiles and they fall in love and she changes her name to Shauna Malwae-Wyatt. Or he is going to be very progressive and change his name to Ben Wyatt Malwae-Tweep. I am so annoyed that he would hypothetically do that.”  
  
Ann Perkins had never seen her best friend jealous before, even when Mark Brendanawicz had asked her on a date. “Leslie, what is going on between you and Ben Wyatt? Are you sleeping with him?”  
  
“No!” Leslie protested. “It is complicated. We are friends. We are roommates with benefits,” she tried to explain but realizing how she sounded, she tried to fix it. “We are roommates who benefit from the fact that we are also friends.”  
  
“I don’t know what that means,” Ann said, baffled. “But it is obvious that you like him, which is a good thing.” She was now smiling.  
  
“What? That’s disgusting and wrong. I don’t even get… why would? I have never liked anyone, anywhere. It’s none of your… you have the nerve, the audacity. Ben is my roommate, technically and he is terrible, face-wise. And how… how I know frankly that you don’t like him? Maybe you like him? Maybe you are trying to throw me off? Check and mate!” Leslie rambled on, but Ann would not budge. “This is an outrage!” she shouted. “Who do I call?”  
  
“Leslie, ready to leave?” Ben came and asked at that moment. Without saying anything else or looking at anyone, Leslie moved towards Ben with her head down and walked back to her car.  
  
She drove them silently to her house, still not looking at him. The silent was unbearable, but she could not say a thing. She had just rambled, admitted words to her best friend that denied her feelings towards the Teen Mayor. She unlocked the door, feeling Ben’s eyes burning a hole at the back of her head. “I am sorry if I kept you apart from Shauna. I can drop you back,” she offered, breaking the silence finally, taking a hesitant step towards the stairs.  
  
“Leslie, wait!” Ben called out instead. He was looking at her directly, his eyes unreadable. Leslie saw his one arm reach out to hers and stop abruptly, realizing what he was doing.  
  
“Yeah?”  
  
“I… I, um,” Ben started, stammering. Leslie gave him a look. He cleared his throat. There was now a stern look on his face. “In my time in the government, I’ve been sent to many towns. I tried to make amends for my failure as a mayor. Then I came here to fix the town and resolve the corruption and then I got killed and I realized, all this time, all these things, it all lead me to you. I know I could never touch you, but I’d rather spend a lifetime being with you and never getting to touch your hair than to be with someone else for a second.”


	11. Chapter 10

_**Chapter 10** _

The Waffle Maker once fell in love with a man and told him that she loved him underwater during scuba diving and what she thought to be the most romantic vacation of her life turned out to be the worst vacation of her life when the man she fell in love with tried to go up so fast he got the bends and they spent the last day of their vacation, and their relationship, at the hospital.

Before that, years before, during high school, the boy she thought would be her high school sweetheart had his mom call her to break up with her for him.

She used to dream with her best friend Ann Perkins when they were younger about having soulmates. Given her curse, or gift as maybe others would call it, she had given up the ideas of a soulmate years ago.

And now, at this very moment, she was standing on her stairs as the man she thought that could actually be a potential soulmate to her was professing his feelings for her.

In all its irony, it made perfect sense that the one man she could potentially see herself together with was the very one she could never actually be with because just an accidental touch could potentially kill him. She could give him a literal kiss of death.

So The Waffle Maker did what she thought was the best.

“I need to go to the Whiz Palace.”

She ran up the stairs so fast, she was breathless when she closed her door, leaned against it and closed her eyes.

When oxygen was finally back in her lungs, she realized she was being childish. She liked Ben Wyatt. Liked liked him. He was cute, he was smart, he made her laugh. He was like a brilliant, sexy little hummingbird.

Running away from him after he handed her his heart was terrible. So she grabbed the saran wrap she kept in her room for emergencies and ran back downstairs. To her luck, former Teen Mayor was standing in the same spot. He looked up when he heard her come down.

“I’m sorry Leslie, I couldn’t fight it anymore,” he started apologizing. When she stopped before him, he took a breath. “I mean, it’s not just me, right?”

She shook her head. “It’s not just you.” She released some of the saran wrap and held it towards his face, then leaned up and kissed him. Ben Wyatt reciprocated at once.

It was the closest they could get without actual skin contact and even that was too much. Despite the piece of plastic, his lips were soft and warm and Leslie wanted nothing more than become a kiss monster and kiss him on his stupid face.

When they pulled back after a moment, Leslie kept her eyes closed and herself still close to him.

His voice was a whisper. “So it’s not just me.”

“It’s not just you,” she replied and then went for another quick peck on his lips. “I’ll now go to my bed and cuddle my pillow and pretend it’s you.”

Ben Wyatt blushed, maybe for the first time in his adult life. “I’ll cuddle my pillow, too, pretending it’s you.”

Leslie Knope looked at the former Teen Mayor and felt like a teenager again, like when she felt with her high school boyfriend and was glad for a moment that Ben Wyatt wouldn’t have his mother call her to break up with her on his behalf. She then smiled at him and went out to feed Li’l Sebastian before going to bed.

In her bed in the dark, Leslie Knope thought about how she was lying in the dark of her room next door to Ben Wyatt. She grabbed one of her three pillows and placed it on the empty side of her bed, imagining it was the former Teen Mayor lying next to her.

At that very moment, the former Teen Mayor next door was doing the same thing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Livejournal dying brought this story back to life! I don't know when I will update but keep your eye on them!


End file.
